Ryan Babel Returns to His Roots with Son Riley in Beautiful Struggles’ FRAMEWORKS
For FRAMEWORKS, Ryan Babel revisits the pink hair, the Amsterdam neighbourhood that shaped him and a new chapter defined by fatherhood and legacy.
Some images follow a footballer long after the final whistle. For Ryan Babel, one of them is impossible to miss: the bright pink hair that became one of the most recognisable looks of his playing career.
For Beautiful Struggles’ new FRAMEWORKS campaign, Babel brings that image back. But this is not a nostalgia piece. Instead, the campaign places two versions of the same person next to each other: the footballer people remember and the father and man he is today.
MORE THAN THE PINK HAIR
The visual reference may be familiar, but the context has changed completely. FRAMEWORKS uses Babel’s pink hair as a bridge between past and present rather than an attempt to recreate an earlier chapter.
That distinction is central to the story. Babel has spent years moving beyond the public image built around football. Here, his past is not erased, but placed alongside the life that followed it. The result is a portrait of identity in motion: childhood, football, fatherhood and the present existing in the same frame.
BACK TO WHERE IT STARTED
Shot in Amsterdam, the campaign sees Ryan and his son Riley return to Kraainest and Kikkenstein, the neighbourhood where Ryan grew up. It is a place he had not visited in more than two decades.
Father and son move through streets and buildings connected to Ryan’s early life, giving Riley a view of the environment that existed before the football career that would take his father around the world.
That return gives the campaign much of its weight. It is not simply about revisiting a location. It is about showing a new generation where part of the previous one was formed — and allowing past and present to meet without pretending they are the same.
A CONVERSATION BETWEEN GENERATIONS
The accompanying film shifts the focus even further away from the public image of the footballer. Riley speaks with his father about success and ambition, fatherhood, growing up in Amsterdam and the difference between how success looked then and how it feels now.
The conversation becomes the emotional centre of FRAMEWORKS. Rather than presenting legacy as a list of achievements, it looks at what is inherited, what changes and what each generation ultimately chooses for itself.
The studio portraits follow the same idea visually. Ryan and Riley are photographed together and separately, using resemblance and contrast to show both their closeness and their individuality. The images feel less like conventional campaign photography and more like a study of two people connected by history while standing in very different stages of life
SPORT, FASHION AND CULTURE
That approach fits naturally with Beautiful Struggles. The independent brand operates at the intersection of sport, fashion and culture, using athletic heritage and lived experience as the basis for its storytelling.
Throughout FRAMEWORKS, Ryan and Riley wear pieces from the brand’s evolving wardrobe, combining current, previous and forthcoming collections. The clothing is present, but it never overwhelms the story. Instead, it becomes part of the visual language connecting football heritage, contemporary style and personal identity.
WHAT YOU CARRY FORWARD
The strongest idea in FRAMEWORKS is also the simplest: legacy is not about preserving the past unchanged.
For Ryan Babel, the pink hair may still be one of the first things people recognise. The campaign does not reject that image. It asks what has happened since — what he has carried with him, what he has left behind and what he now passes on to his son.
That is where FRAMEWORKS moves beyond a fashion campaign. It becomes a story about the space between generations, and about the way a life in football can remain part of someone’s identity without continuing to define the whole person.
Beautiful Struggles’ CAPSULE 02, accompanied by the FRAMEWORKS campaign featuring Ryan and Riley Babel, is available from 7 September 2026.
Ready for More?
Liked reading about Ryan and Riley Babel’s journeys back to their roots, read about Ryan Babel’s life as a footballer and musician, and how he’s constantly reinvinting himself.
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